Thursday, July 21, 2011

Pussycat Dolls Present, Search For the Next Doll

Pussycat Dolls Present: The Search for the Next Doll is the first season of Pussycat Dolls Present: that premiered on March 6, 2007 on The CW, and took place over the course of eight weeks. It was a joint venture between Ken Mok's 10x10 Entertainment, Pussycat LLC, Interscope A&M Records, Wonderland Sound and Vision, and Warner Horizon Television.

The series followed a group of young women as they went through an audition process to join the girl group, the Pussycat Dolls. The contestants, who also lived together during the course of the series, were groomed by the group's founder and the series' creator and co-producer, Robin Antin, and were judged on their vocal and dancing ability. The winner went on to join the Pussycat Dolls as the act's seventh member, and appeared in the series but performed with the group only once since after opting to go solo

In the UK, the show started airing on T4 (the Channel 4 weekend teenage block programming slot) on April 1, 2007. In Australia, the show debuted on Ten Network on April 1, 2007.

Contestant

Kelli, Ewa, Sandra, Shauntae, Catherine, Anjelia, Jasmin, Natascha and Robyn were the nine semi-finalists who didn't make it to the final. Most of them got sick before performing, leading to the infamous vomiting sequence.

Brittany Diiorio entered the competition at the age of 20. It has been suggested that a vague similarity to Jessica also prevented Brittany's advancement in the show. Originally from Chesapeake, Virginia, Brittany now lives in Virginia Beach, managing a night club and pursuing a dancing, singing, and modeling career. Brittany now goes by the name Danielle Diiorio (Dani D) to avoid comparisons to Britney Spears and has undergone a major look change and has released three songs on her Myspace called Let me Breathe, Girlfriend and Higher. She later replaced them with another one called Non-Exclusive. She has also been on the cover of Way too social Magazine.

At the age of 21, Jaime Benjamin originally from Philadelphia, now lives in NYC and works as a production assistant.. Some say Jaime was eliminated too suddenly, possibly prompted by her resemblance to both Kimberly and Ashley. Following her elimination, she stated her favorite experience on the show was getting ready to perform on stage in front of a live audience. Jaime is currently negotiating a record deal with major labels for her CD. She has recently created a Music Myspace where she released a sneak preview of it containing 4 songs: Fame, Lifetime and Lovin' me (normal and Hell's Kitchen mix version),. She has also posted several videos on Youtube including song performances and sneak peeks, thank you to fans and silly videos (sometime with Melissa R.). She has proven to be quite popular, being ranked 3rd on the CW Lounge, while being 8th on the show. She also performed solo at Sony in NYC on August's 17th

The oldest of the group was Sisely Treasure (24). Former member of Cooler Kids, she lives in Los Angeles, working as a dance instructor. Sisely, has released 3 songs on her Myspace: Smoke and Ashes, The Other side and Do the Robot, although the former two have since been removed. She and her group (Sisely Treasure and the Safety Pin-ups) are also selling a limited edition of Do the Robot on Teen Acide records. She is now a dancing performer in the group Gunn Metal Grey under the name Luci Glitoris Since early 2008, Sisley has been tapped as the new lead singer of electronic rock band Shiny Toy Guns. She co-wrote and recorded with them for their second album, Season of Poison, and is touring with them throughout the fall.

Mariela Arteaga resides in Miami, Florida and was 21 when she entered the competition. She then later became a model on Deal or No Deal, starting in the 4th season. Mariela now currently models for Skechers commerials and print ad.

Prior to the series, Anastacia Rose McPherson from West Hollywood, was a backup dancer for The Pussycat Dolls’ music video “Don't Cha.“ Ironically, in a post-show interview, the 23-year-old named her final performance, a burlesque themed act, as her favorite performance.. She worked as a make-up artist and song lyricist. Anastacia has released 4 songs on her new Myspace Music page called: Share, Checkin you out, Get Away and I want in Anastacia has also worked as a backstage interviewer at SmackDown!, making her debut at on the 12th October show, until her release from the company shortly after on the 8 January 2008. She also appears in Famouz's video for Wriggle. Anastacia has also had an appearance on a new second season of the game show called Duel as a "chip girl" where she hands out and takes away the chips of the contestants. The second season started on April 4, 2008 and ended on July 25, 2008 with a future of the new show unannounced.

Miss West Broward USA 2007, Chelsea Korka (20) is rumoured to have a 4 octave vocal range just as Christina Aguilera. Chelsea has released two songs on her myspace site: "Give Me A Sign" and "Better Than. She is also expected to perform at the Las Vegas PCD Lounge with both Melody Thornton and Robin Antin, making her the first contestant to officially perform with the PCD outside the show. Robin Antin also decided to add Chelsea Korka to her new group the Paradiso Girls. She has also appeared on Space Cowboy's "Falling Down" and LMFAO's La La La music video. She is now a member of the girl band Paradiso Girls whose hit single is "Patron Tequila" featuring Lil Jon and Eve.

Runner-up Melissa Reyes (18) appeared in Paris Hilton's Promo Tour 2006, as Pilot/Series Regular in Nickelodeon’s Giggle Club, Paris Hilton’s video Nothing in this World (as a cheerleader cameo), Mariah Carey’s video Get Your Number (cameo), B5's video "U Got Me" (as a featured girl), Lil' Romeo's video My Girlfriend (cameo) and Keak da Sneak's video 3 Freaks (cameo) Melissa was also in Corbin Bleu's video, "Deal With It" and NLT's video, "That Girl" dancing with V. Online rumours accuse Robin Antin of a tendency to choose Asia over Melissa R. because of Melissa R.'s uncanny resemblance to Nicole (both are of Filipino descent). She was Audrey Magazine's cover girl for the June/July issue, which included a five-page article titled A Real Doll where she states that she hopes to become a recognized artist. She went on to appear on musical videos such as Corbin Bleu's "Deal With It" (filmed before the show's airing), Marques Houston's "Wonderful", in all of which she plays the singer's love interest and in NLT (band)'s "That Girl" where she was one of the four love interests. She has also appeared in some Keshia Chanté videos, such as Let the Music Take You while she was in Toronto Canada. She has been a special guest at the Northern California dance contest in Hayward, CA where she gave a pre-show performance. She has an album underway and has released two songs on iTunes. She was scheduled to play the lead part in a television show called 'Unity', as a character named Melissa, coincidentally but the show has not been picked up. She was also on the cover of Fokal magazine, Fall 2008 issue

Winner Asia Nitollano (18) is a young mother to a baby daughter; she and the father are still together, despite her being promoted on the show as a single mom. Some fans of Melissa R. and Chelsea have made the popular assumption that Asia was chosen on purely an image point of view, as Nicole is the only Pussycat Doll who sings consistently. After being declared the winner of The Search for the Next Doll several online rumours surfaced that claimed Asia was kicked out of the group due to lack of musical ability, others claimed the other dolls couldn't deal with her diva attitude. As a final verdict to discredit the rumours, CW's head of programming, Dawn Orstroff explained that, though Asia was not booted out of the group, she will not be the next doll, because in an overtly bold move, she skipped all the way to pursuing a solo career. However, lack of confirmation by either Robin Antin or the Pussycat Dolls themselves have caused many fans to wonder if Asia's split with the group was completely her own decision. Some fans also point out the inconsistency of Asia's claims throughout the show of how much she wanted to be the next doll against the decision to go solo before even one tour or album with the Dolls. Critics point out that fans of Asia will definitely be disappointed as they will not be seeing her on stage nor purchasing one of her albums for a while because she has not been signed.

After the show Melissa Smith, Melissa Reyes and Chelsea Korka performed the Pink Panther/Fever Medley with the English burlesque group Girlesque at the Fashion cares event, this has led fans to believe that they had started a group which turned out to be false.